Another Man's Treasure (Joey Bada$$ Story)

Part Otto

After a night spent at Joey’s hotel during which neither of us got any sleep (I had to get up every two hours to hush Latara’s crying and he pretended to sleep through it, although I did catch him sighing in annoyance once in a while), he woke me up at eleven in the morning to start getting dressed.

“Rise and shine,” He clapped his hands above my head. “We got places to be, shorty.”

“Where are we going again?” I asked, turning my head over into the pillow so he wouldn’t smell my dragon breath.

“To my house. I already showered so you can go in now.”

I pushed myself up from the bed, my hair messier than it’s ever been. I could actually feel the bags under my eyes.

“I don’t have anything for me to change into once I get out of the shower and neither does Latara,” I told Joey.

“You can wear some of my clothes, I’ll give you the smallest things I have. As for the baby...just leave her in what she’s wearing. It ain’t that big of a deal.” He shrugged and turned on the TV, dismissing me from his hotel room.

I tied my hair back with two of my own strands and woke up Tara (I don’t know why Joey hadn’t done it already). She didn’t fuss at first, so I figured I should take her to the tub before she had the chance. I closed the bathroom door behind us and began to give her a quick and thorough shower.

This didn’t feel like a good idea. Being in a hotel room with my baby and a stranger. I didn’t know Joey at all; the fact that he was famous didn’t change anything. He was three years younger than me and acted a lot like it. I could hear him on the phone with his friends, giggling like a high school boy. He’s only nineteen, anyway. I couldn’t expect too much of him. Still, he was who I depended on for now, and he didn’t seem like such a strong support system.

I bathed along with Latara, only cleaning the important parts and washing my face with their sweet lemon-sage soap. I use one of the towels as a makeshift toga for Latara, and wrap the other one around my chest.

“Joey?” I called to him when I exited the bathroom. He was nowhere to be found, but the beds were still messy and his clothes were still littered about the floor.

“I’m here,” He came back into the room with a plastic bag in hand. “Diapers.” He smiles broadly.

“Where’d you get these?”

“At some supermarket a few blocks down. I guess I came back just in time.” He handed me the bag and began bending down to clear the floor of his clothes. With each t-shirt or pair of jeans, he stuffed them into his one duffle bag, no folding required. I took one of the diapers from the pack, put it on Latara, and let her wear the same onesie she had on yesterday. ‘It ain’t that big of a deal’.

Unlike Joey, I didn’t have much to clear from the hotel room. Just Latara’s things, mostly. After a few moments I was all done, and took the opportunity to feed Tara. She’d have to make it with crushed pear and corn until later. I didn’t know how long it would take us to get to Brooklyn or if we’d be able to make stops, but I had a bit more food left in her bag. If we were able to stop, I’d take care of the moaning in my own stomach.

Joey took about ten more minutes cleaning up the room, gathering his weed and socks and combing through the nappy head of hair on his head. Finally, he winked at himself in the mirror and said: “Let’s go.”

We checked out at the front desk and met the guys outside in a tour bus so large that it couldn’t even fit in the valet driveway.

Joey opened one of the doors and helped me up the bus’ high steps. Inside, where it looked like a low-rent apartment, everyone I’d seen at the concert was waiting for us: T’nah, Chuck, A La Sole, Dyemond, Nyck, Kirk, CJ, Dessy, Kwon, Sanchez and Rokamouth. I looked at all of them, greeting them, and wondered how nice it would be to have Steez in the bus along with us. Or maybe it wouldn’t be nice for me - I’d probably not appreciate it, not until he was gone.